For the first design assignment of MSPM I wanted to gather a few resources on the fundamentals of human-centered design (HCD), focusing mostly on the theory behind HCD. Let’s just say, mission accomplished. To push myself to think critically about these sources, I posed to myself response questions in bold throughout my (non-exhaustive) summary of the resources below.
The grade I gave myself for this assignment: 82/100.
First, I wanted to recap the basics of human-centered design by reviewing my recent summaries of The Design of Everyday Things (chapter summaries in the Winter 2023 section of BYOMSPM). The basic idea of HCD is that you repeatedly use divergent and convergent thinking, first to solidify a problem statement, then to align on a solution, and finally as you iteratively test, measure, and address the effectiveness of the solution. A key aspect of human-centered design, repeated in many resources I’ve seen, is an emphasis on the importance of making sure that you’re solving the actual root problem rather than another problem posing as one. They emphasize that people often jump to solutioning before fully confirming that the problem they’re trying to solve is the right (aka core) problem to be solving. The other main point that really struck me from the book was that another core tenet of human-centered is making the experience of using a product not just positive but enjoyable. This, I reflected, is a noble goal that will certainly make for great product experiences, but in reality I’m guessing that it usually becomes an expensive, nice-to-have aspect of product design.
Then, to get another perspective on HCD, I listened to a podcast called “What If Human-Centered Design Isn’t Enough?” that discusses the distinguishing characteristics of HCD as well as a few of its key limitations.
The first topic of the podcast was the difference between human-centered design and humanity-centered design. The main point was that human-centered design focuses on individual humans but not so much on related concerns like the health of the planet or bigger societal systems that involve many humans. Can you think of ways that classic human-centered design has failed to consider larger-scale impacts of products? Maybe I’m oversimplifying, but cars seem like an obvious example. They were designed to meet the human need to quickly transport themselves and their belongings with a high degree of autonomy, speed, and affordability, but obviously the designers of cars failed to consider how the proliferation of gas-based vehicles would negatively impact the environment. A similar example shared later in the podcast is products that are centered around convenience (i.e. food delivery), which have the unintended consequence of lots of extra physical waste.
The next topic was a juicy one: would human-centered design more accurately be called corporation-centered design because profit is typically the ultimate goal rather than just meeting individual human needs? The guests on the podcast explained that the original goal of human-centered design was to consider products in the context of daily activities, but decades ago it was picked up by businesses as a viable strategy to be more competitive in the markets. Today, human-centered design is used widely in a business-context. What do you think? Would it be more accurate to rename human-centered design to corporation-centered design? My first thought is that if the argument is that corporate designers prioritize corporate interests over the interests of individual humans, I think the definition of individual human interests is widely subjective, so it’s a little difficult to argue that we are definitively not prioritizing them. That said, I still generally agree that the priority of the designers of most products in the world today aligns more closely with the interests of corporations rather than the more generally accepted measures of success of human experience and human life.
The last question on the podcast was that while these ideas about challenging the corporate motivations of designs today sound great in theory, how can we actually make any change in a world run by these same corporations? The solution that stuck with me most was their suggestion that while designers might not always be the ones making the biggest decisions, they can still focus on striving to be the ones in conversations that offer better options to the decision-makers.
Lastly, I listened to a two-part podcasts on UX Podcast with guest Don Norman, author of The Design of Everyday Things (that book I mentioned above). The podcasts were very high-level, philosophical discussions on the role of design as well as design school in the world today.
The first point I took away from the podcast was Norman’s opinion that design school has historically been based off of art and architecture school, but he argues that art and design are not the same; design is meant for problem solving, while that is not the purpose of art. Thus, he believes that the education shouldn’t be the same but rather that design education should be more cross-disciplinary to better reflect the real world. How do you think art and design are similar or different? I completely agree that the primary purpose of design is to solve a problem while art is first and foremost a method of communication and expression. However, I think there is significant room for overlap – you can problem-solve (design) in a highly expressive way, and you can express and communicate (do art) in a way that aims to address or solve problems.
The other point I liked from the podcast was that a common mistake of designers is applying generally accepted solutions to common problems without considering local circumstances specific to a single scenario. I feel like this seems self-explanatory, but I still think it’s important to repeatedly remind ourselves of it to keep it at the top of our minds.
Overall, my takeaway is that human-centered design is still “in,” given that you can keep these other considerations in the back of your head. Excited to dive into some more design topics in the coming weeks.
Thanks for reading.
Works Cited
“What If Human-Centered Design Isn’t Enough?” With Intent. 1 March 2023. Spotify.
“#263 Creating a better society with Don Norman (part 1).” UX Podcast. 20 May 2021. Spotify.
“#263 Creating a better society with Don Norman (part 2).” UX Podcast. 3 June 2021. Spotify.
BYOMSPM 
Leave a comment